“Are you sure that we can do this?” Evie asked nervously as she peered into what we were all hoping was the last cavern in this Den. “We’re all pretty tired. We could come back another day.”

“And then we’d have to fight even more of these monster rabbits to get to this point,” I sighed. “We’ve still got a decent number of potions I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

“Zeke’s right,” Kelly agreed. “Besides there’s no way that thing can fit into this tunnel so if something goes wrong. So, all that we need to do is retreat.”

I nodded as I glanced into the cavern at the massive monster that was waiting for us. The beast was called the Rabbit Matriarch and was almost three times the size of an Armoured Rabbit. Obviously, this thing was the Boss of this Den and I was pretty sure that it would at least try to summon allies to help it fight which was why we had doubled back to make sure that we hadn’t missed any monsters. We hadn’t found any but I was still going to keep an eye out just in case.

“It’s going to be a tough fight though,” Warren admitted, and I nodded in agreement.

While the Matriarch didn’t have the full body armoured plating that the Armoured Rabbits had. It did have smaller armoured plates that seemed to be positioned to protect its internal organs. This combined with its massive size told me that this thing was going to have a truly enormous health pool as well as being able to do a serious amount of damage. It probably wasn’t going to be anywhere as fast as the other rabbits thanks to its size, but other than that we didn’t really know anything about its abilities so we would have to be careful until we had a better idea what we were going to be dealing with, but I was confident that this Party would be able to do that. There were a number of situations where it was definitely possible we could wipe but that was only if we didn’t have Warren and Kelly on our team.

“Alright, are we ready everyone?” I asked once we had finished making sure that we had distributed our stock of potions properly.

Once the others had confirmed that they were ready I turned to Warren who nodded and charged out into the cavern shield first.

As soon as it noticed him the Matriarch raised its head and roared angrily revealing its teeth which I noticed were razor sharp and almost as long as my forearm as I followed my slightly crazy friend. Seeing this Warren simply laughed at the monster as he smashed its face with his shield and followed it up with a powerful blow from his sceptre that made sure that all of the monster’s attention was on him. The massive rodent screamed in outrage at my friend as he deflected its first mighty blow aside with all the skill of over a decade of experience as one of the best Tanks that I had ever met.

A grin crossed my face as I sent a surge of lightning at the oversized rodent as it tried to hit Warren who danced around or deflected its powerful attacks with his shield. So far things were going exactly as expected but we all knew that could change quickly.

As it turned out we didn’t even have to wait that long as after one of Fern’s attacks left a particularly nasty looking gash in the rabbit’s haunch it suddenly leapt several feet into the air. As my gaze naturally followed its sudden flight, I noticed for the first time that that this cavern had a surprisingly high ceiling for the first time before coming crashing down with enough force to create a massive shockwave that sent all of the melee fighters tumbling to the ground. Apparently, this was its first Skill and it was definitely one that could cause a lot of issues for us if we let it use it too often.

Groaning I slowly dragged myself to my feet as I cursed internally for not realising that the cavern had a high ceiling earlier because if I had noticed, we might have been prepared for that attack. As I looked up to see the Boss thundering across the cavern towards the ranged members of our party. A quick look over at Warren told me that he had been hit harder than I had by the shockwave because he was still flat out on his back.

“Guess that it’s up to me then,” I groaned as I finished pushing myself to my feet with my naginata. Raising my hand, I activated my Barrier Skill in the hopes of slowing the Boss down before breaking into a sprint.

The Boss smashed through the Barrier with ease and then smashed into the wall of earth that Kelly had created behind it which slowed it down long enough for the girls to get out of the way. I paused long enough to breathe a slight sigh of relief and check everyone’s HP and SP before darting into melee once more.

“Well, that was unexpected,” Kelly chuckled as we ran past each other. “Thanks for your help Zeke. Now go and kick that things ass!”

“Yes ma’am,” I shouted back as I kept running towards the giant rabbit which had careened headfirst into the entrance of the tunnel and somehow managed to get its head stuck which would have been amusing in any other situation. It was at this time that I decided that I would do the cliché thing when something like this happened and activated my Lunge Skill and shot forwards and stabbed my naginata into the rabbit’s unarmoured butt. The rabbit screamed in pain and lashed out with one of its hind legs forcing me to let go of my weapon which had gotten stuck on something.

I fired a Jolt at the rabbit as it finally pulled its head out of the tunnel and turned towards me. The monster howled in rage as it glared at me with bloodshot eyes and lowered its head to charge at me. I somehow managed to dodge this surprisingly quick attack by throwing myself into a clumsy cartwheel and grimaced as something popped in my wrist. Sometimes the realism of this world was a literal pain but then again a little bit of pain from a strained wrist was a lot less than what I would’ve had to deal with if the Rabbit Matriarch had managed to hit me with that last attack

As the massive beast turned towards me I noticed Warren had managed to get back up and he grinned at me as he ran up behind the Boss and I groaned internally as I realised what he was going to do next.

Sure enough a few seconds later there was a loud thump and the rabbit howled as it leapt into the air once more before crashing back to the ground and writhing in pain for a few seconds before turning its attention to my friend. I groaned when I saw how deep my naginata had been driven into the monster’s rear thanks to my friend. There was no way that I was going to be getting it out any time soon.

“Sorry man!” Warren laughed when he saw me glaring at him. “I couldn’t resist!”

“Not funny dude,” I grumbled back at him as I opened my Inventory and pulled out the spear that I had started the game with. After one quick test thrust to remind myself how the weapon felt in my hands I dove back into combat.

The next few minutes went pretty much as expected. The naginata sticking out of its back end meant that the Boss couldn’t use its leaping attack again but instead its attacks had started to get faster and faster. Only when I leapt back to avoid a sudden sweeping attack did I finally realise that this change in speed was because the monster had been shrinking!

At the start of the fight the Rabbit Matriarch had been truly huge in both height and girth but now it wasn’t anywhere near as fat as it used to be.

“Well that’s one hell of a boss mechanic,” I muttered to myself as I turned and sprinted in Kelly’s direction to make sure that she knew what was happening. Once I explained the situation Kelly sighed and shook her head.

“I’d been hoping that I was wrong about that,” she admitted. “It’s not like we can really do much about it after all.”

“That’s not actually the reason that I’m telling you this,” I replied as I fired a Jolt at the Boss. “I’m worried about what could happen if something goes wrong.”

“Are you suggesting that it might be able to follow us down the tunnel?” Kelly asked as she raised an eyebrow at me.

“Not yet, but at the rate that it’s shrinking it might be able to be soon,” I replied seriously.

“Hmm, yeah you’re right,” Kelly nodded after a couple of seconds eying the monster. “We need to increase the pace then because it’s still hitting just as hard as it was when the fight started. It just got faster.”

“Yeah, that going to be difficult,” I pointed out as I waved my spear. “This thing doesn’t deal anywhere near as much damage as my naginata and the Soul Core isn’t as good either.”

“Well, at least you still have it,” Kelly replied but I knew from the worried look on her face that she knew that I was right.

“True,” I nodded as I raised my hand and fired another blast of lightning at the Boss. “Well, I guess I’d better get back to it then.”

Lightning still streaming from my fingers I ran back into the fray. The Rabbit Matriarch’s body was covered in gashes and it was clear from the mad howling that was escaping its foaming mouth that it was in an incredible amount of pain. I almost felt sorry for the long-eared monster for a few moments then I remembered that the other Rabbits had supposedly been attacking travellers and any sympathy that I felt disappeared completely.

Fern glanced towards me as she rolled to her feet as blood spewed from the gashes that her most recent attack had left in the Boss’ hide and was about to say something to me when we both heard familiar shrieks coming from the tunnel. I cursed loudly as I immediately recognised the sound as one that I had heard many times before over the past few days.

“Shit!” I shouted as familiar grey forms spewed from the entrance of the tunnel. “How many did it summon?”

The Voracious Rabbits screamed even louder as they swarmed towards us and I moved to intercept them when I saw a distracted Warren get sent flying backwards when he misjudged the angle of a powerful swipe from the Rabbit Matriarch. The Matriarch then threw its head back and howled once more eliciting another ear-splitting screech from its smaller brethren and red mist appeared around some of them as they charged blindly towards me.

“You guys finish of the Boss!” I shouted as I stabbed the first of the rabbits before bringing the other end of my spear around in time to smash another one into the wall of the cavern with the other end. Blood thundered in my ears as more rabbits streamed into the cavern and surrounded me “I got these.”

Electricity jumped from my body as I activated my Static Armour spell. This situation was exactly what this spell was for. I had at least three Levels on even the strongest of the Voracious Rabbits that had joined the fight and even with the berserker rage that had infected most of them I knew that they wouldn’t be able to do all that much damage to me with my new armour. I just hoped that the Rabbit Matriarch didn’t have some sort f Skill that Buffed these things.

Holding my spear in both hands I kept my attack motions small enough that I could counter just about all the attacks from the rabbits. Unfortunately there were so many of them that they were able to surround me completely which meant that a lot of attacks did get through my defences but that was what Static Armour was for and soon I was surrounded by a number of bleeding or smoking corpses without really taking that much damage.

Sweat dripped down my neck as I stabbed and bashed the monsters that were attacking me. An odd yet familiar cool sensation filled my limbs as I fought, and my movements became even faster. This state of being was known as ‘the zone.’ Top tier athletes and gamers had been claiming for years that they had been able to enter the zone when they had performed extremely well but I had never really paid much attention to it myself until a couple of years ago.

I had been playing with Warren and Kelly, or rather it had been Julian_the_great and Kelly at the time. Anyway, we had been in the middle of a fight with a boss and Warren had made one of his extremely rare mistakes and taken out by the Boss. When I saw him fall, I knew that I needed to step up or we were going to get wiped on a dungeon run that had taken us nearly ten hours at that point.

At the time I had been playing a class called an Ice Skirmisher which was basically a cross between a spearman and an ice mage that could conjure massive icicles to use as both ranged and melee weapons as well as walls of ice to defend itself or others from enemies. Most of the time an Ice Skirmisher was a support character but as per usual I played in a slightly different way than normal and was specced out as a melee fighter that could also control enemies with ice magic. According to the Kelly and some of the other people that we had been playing with that day what happened next was one of the most impressive displays of skill that they had ever seen from an amateur player. Since an Ice Skirmisher was primarily a support character, I didn’t have a lot of HP but that hadn’t really mattered.

I had pinned the Boss which had been a massive eight foot tall minotaur that wielded a pair of double bladed battle-axes in both hands but even wielding two weapons it had been hard pressed to even hit me as I danced around its attacks. By the time we finished the monster off it looked more like it was part porcupine instead of part bull due to the sheer number of icicles sticking out of it. As for me I had been clinging to life by less than 10% if my HP which was a testament to how well the healers had done to keep my fragile character alive since even one successful hit shaved off more than 10% of my max HP. I had avoided most of the attacks, but the minotaur Boss had some nasty skills that were either practically impossible to dodge or in the case of one particularly nasty one impossible.

I had entered the zone several more times over the years. Usually only when I had been playing the game for a few months and was fighting more powerful monsters like Bosses, but I had come close on multiple occasions since starting to play Soul Core Online. My spear turned into a blur in my hands and the number of bodies continued to pile up even after my Static Armour timed out. I was guessing that the Rabbit Matriarch had summoned all these monsters from the fields surrounding town which was why they had taken so long to arrive and why there were so many of them.

Warren shouted something to me as I thrust the point of my spear through the back of one particularly aggressive rabbit’s head and I turned around to see that either he or Fern had somehow managed to dislodge my naginata from the Boss’ rump and Fern was sprinting in my direction being chased by the enraged Boss. Ignoring the rabbits headbutting or snapping at me with their sharp teeth I took careful aim with my spear and hurled it over her head at the Rabbit Matriarch’s face. Unfortunately I missed the monstrous rabbit’s eye by a couple of inches but the surprise attack was enough to cause it to flinch mid hop which allowed Fern to get close enough that she could safely toss me my main weapon and I shouted a thanks to the dusky rogue as I swept the bladed polearm around at knee height.

With my damage output restored to normal the furry bodies of my attackers increased with just about every attack and a few minutes later I was able to take a short breather. The corpses of about 50 Voracious Rabbits of varying sizes surrounded me and I was covered in guts and blood, but I was victorious.

A halo of light surrounded me as Evie cast her healing spell on me bringing my HP up to just over 50% and I turned my sights on the Boss which looked like it was on its last legs. Then again, we were all looking like we were on our last legs as well so it wasn’t like we could let our guard down even now.

Activating Lunge with the last of my SP I hurled myself into the fray once more. I was seriously impressed that the Boss was still standing with the amount of damage it had taken. It was also pretty obvious that the others had focussed on preventing it from reaching its top speed when they had noticed that it had been getting faster.

It was also obvious that I had missed something while I had been fighting the swarm of bloodthirsty rabbits that the Boss had summoned because the ranged members of our party were balancing on a wall of earth that Kelly had created. Warren was looking pretty banged up as well, but I knew without even looking at his face that he was grinning from ear to ear. Warren loved nothing more to be pushed to his limits and he often told me that the moments when he was were the ones where he truly felt alive. Personally, I wasn’t a big fan of taking hits like he did, but I completely understood what he meant when he said that. Fern’s blades and armour were almost as well covered in gore as I was, and I could see the exhaustion in her eyes, but determination glimmered there as well. The same determination that I could see in the faces of all my other friends as well. We had all decided that we would beat this Boss.

Since I had used up the last of my SP earlier I was only able to do regular attacks but with the amount of damage that the Boss had taken it only took a couple of more minutes before its once behemoth body grew still. As the monster finally fell there was a sudden fanfare followed by a large screen appearing in front of everyone simultaneously.

Hidden Event Completed!

Congratulations!

You have killed the Rabbit Matriarch and her offspring that was terrorising the town of Palamar. Now that the Matriarch has been slain the number of rabbits that will appear in the surrounding area will decrease to normal and the creatures that fled will return to bring balance to the ecosystem. Bring the head of the beast to the Captain of the Town Guards to receive your reward.

“Oh, thank god,” Warren gasped as he collapsed onto his back. “That thing was tough!”

A quick check of my Soul Links screen told me that that I had earned almost 70 SP from this fight alone. Despite this the only Soul Core that had Levelled Up was my Lightning Magic one although the others were now over halfway to Levelling Up again. I brought up my upgrade options with a flick of my finger.

Congratulations your Basic Lightning Magic Core has reached Level 5!

Please pick an upgrade from the choices provided.

Increase Intelligence by 1.

Increase SP regen by 0.5

Soul Points: 44/150

I quickly selected the option to increase my SP regen and turned my attention to the others who were checking their own screens, so I decided to loot the Boss’ corpse.

I whistled as a massive pelt, a pair of large teeth and miscellaneous alchemical ingredients appeared in my Inventory. With how tough the Rabbit Matriarch had been to kill I knew that the pelt would be able to be made into some excellent leather armour and the teeth could probably be made into decent weapons as well. Now that was done, I activated my Soul Harvest Skill and was forced to cover my eyes when the corpse flashed with a blinding light.

When the light faded all that remained of the corpse was a crystal about the size of my fist and I reached down with shaking hands to pick it up before examining the Soul Shard.

Rabbit Matriarch’s Soul Shard (Crafting Material)

Item Tier (Rarity): Special (Epic)

A Soul Shard containing a fragment of the essence of a Rabbit Matriarch. Can be used to create a special Soul Core.

Core Affinities: HP (large) Strength (medium), Agility (medium).

Attached Skill: Streamlining: You gain 1 Agility for every 20% of your maximum HP that you lose up to a maximum of 4.

Cooldown: 1 day.

“Holy shit,” I muttered as I stared at the screen.

“What is it boss?” Fern asked when she glanced over to me.

“This Soul Shard is incredible!” I exclaimed. “It even has a Skill attached to it that increases your Agility when you lose HP.”

“Really?” she asked. “You’re right that is incredible!”

“It does have a cooldown of a whole day, but I can see it being really good for Boss fights,” I said. “It would suit your fighting style perfectly.”

“Are you sure?” she asked. “It would suit you as well.”

“Don’t get too excited, I chuckled. “It’s going to be a while before I can make a Core that’s good enough to use this on. But yes, I think that you will get the best use out of this Skill.”

“That’s nice you two but I’m exhausted,” Warren said as he threw his burly arms over our shoulder with a laugh. “Let’s head back to town and get that reward so that we can celebrate.”

“Sounds like a plan to me.”